^2 BIlvD STUDIES WITH A CAMERA 



It was in this island — if a patch of cat-tails grow- 

 ing in three feet of water can bo called an island — 

 that we fonnd the first two of numerous Least Bit- 

 terns' nests, and here our camera studies were made. 

 These nests were tyjiical in form and site ; one con- 

 tained five and the other four^" eggs, from which 

 the birds had apparently departed as we pushed our 

 boat toward thenr. 



Less than twenty minutes later we again passed 

 these nests and found, to our surprise, that in cue 

 all four, and in the other two eggs had been punc- 

 tured, as if by an awl. Here was a mystery which 

 my Companion, who was examining the second nest 

 while I was studying the first, quickly solved by 

 seeing a Long-billed Marsh Wren actually make an 

 attack on tlie remaining three eggs, and a little 

 later a bird of the same species — perhaps the same 

 individual, since the Bitterns' nests were not more 

 than twenty yards apart — visited the first nest 

 to complete its work on the five already ruined 

 eggs. 



Our attempt to photograph the energetic little 

 marauder failed, nor did we succeed in learning the 

 real cause of its remarkable destructiveness. How- 

 ever, the fact that in one nest alone it drove its 

 needlelike bill into all five eggs without pausing to 

 feast on their contents, would imply that it was not 

 pro)npted Ijy hunger, and, much against our will, we 

 were forced to attribute the bird's actions to pure 

 viciousness ; though, it is trTie, there may have been 

 another side to the story, in which the Bittern was 

 the culpi'it. 



The owners fif the four eggs did not return while 



